


The Trouble With Me Is My Troubles With You

by gimmefire



Series: Your Tenth Shot of Tequila [2]
Category: MotoGP RPF, Motorcycling RPF
Genre: Angst, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-02
Updated: 2013-11-03
Packaged: 2017-12-31 06:58:53
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,438
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1028658
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gimmefire/pseuds/gimmefire
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jorge's stood there at the top of the steps, in slacks and a well-loved t-shirt, peering down at him in curious surprise. Matt offers the Spaniard a slightly sheepish smile and speaks into the phone. "I'm a bit busy."</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> 2013\. Title taken from the Skin song [The Trouble With Me](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8_BTofcuYD4). Beta by [mackem](http://archiveofourown.org/users/mackem). Contains gratuitous use of Sexy Spanish.

Matt isn't sure he'll ever get used to the sight of Cal riding him. Truthfully, he doesn't want to; part of the thrill of it lies in how it still blows him away every time. The arch in his back, the way the light glints off the sweat at the ridge of his spine, the flex of his powerful thighs as he lifts his body up and eases back down again, deep penetration bringing forth guttural moans. Sometimes when Matt's cock is buried inside him, he rolls his hips, rotates them, almost whimpering at the sensations he feels. Sometimes Matt grips his waist and lifts his hips in time; sometimes Cal wants things entirely under his control and he pins Matt's wrists to the bed as he fucks himself on the older man's cock. Today it's the latter. Matt lets himself sink into his powerlessness, arms limp as he focusses on the sounds and the curses and the tight heat and friction. Cal only releases Matt when he brings his hand forward to jerk himself off, his other hand loosening its grip enough for Matt to grasp it tightly in his own as he comes.

Cal eventually eases himself forward, making a rough noise in the back of his throat as Matt's spent cock slips out of him - that's a sight Matt hasn't gotten used to either - and wipes his come-slick hand on the sheets, to Matt's displeasure. "I've still got to sleep in here, you know."

"When I'm around, you don't do that much sleeping," Cal chuckles over his shoulder, unrepentant. He turns around, all awkward legs and sated noises, until he's knelt over Matt and bending for a full, slow kiss.

Matt has the urge to say _but you're not always around_ , but he clamps down on it. No sense in provoking the honey badger when he's being so...compliant isn't the right word. Romantic? No, that's not it. Nice? It's a bit more than nice. Maybe Matt should stop thinking about it and concentrate on the way he's being kissed, the taste and the lazy rhythm of it. Cal is there, and his, in that moment.

"Stay for a bit, if you like," he murmurs, fingers trailing through the hair down Cal's chest.

Cal grins, full of mocking, deliberately hovering just out of reach when Matt lifts his head for another kiss. "You want to spoon?"

Matt snorts and pretends that he doesn't. Cal does stay, keen as he seems to be to kiss the night away, and Matt has no problem with this at all; he arches up as Cal's mouth tracks across his throat and chest, tongue flat and broad against his nipple, hands sweeping over his ribs, stomach and waist as he eases Matt onto his side. Cal rolls the other way, broad chest pressing against his back, on and for a heartbeat-skipping moment Matt thinks that maybe they _are_ going to spoon, but Cal's hands and mouth are soon far too active for that. He scatters kisses over any skin he can reach, shoulders, neck, the scalp beneath closely shorn hair, each one slow and deliberate, until Matt feels like he's being gradually hypnotised or lulled into a doze. The arm he has draped over Matt's waist snakes up to his chest, thumb idly rubbing his nipple until it's erect and increasingly sensitive. "Nice?" he asks softly, and Matt only hums sleepily in response, unconsciously tilting his head when Cal's tongue swipes his earlobe. It's a slow burn of pleasure he builds in Matt's gut, no urgency in his movements now he's gotten himself off, and Matt would comment on his rare gentleness - _yeah, this is nice, now what have you done with the real Cal?_ \- but he finds he doesn't have the presence of mind.

"Gimme a kiss," Cal demands in a voice too gentle to be truly demanding, and Matt complies with a chuckle, craning his head back for Cal to capture his lips.

Cal soon turns his attention away from Matt's mouth to his own hand, slathering two of his fingers in spit, in his mouth right to the knuckle. Matt is a little too caught up in the way his skin is tingling to process the sight beyond it being a turn on, and so he gasps when those wet fingers are pushing between his cheeks and pressing against his hole.

"Relaaaax," Cal purrs into the skin at his shoulder, fingertips rubbing the ring of muscle. The older man's body jerks when one of those fingertips dips inside, the sensation shooting up his spine like an electric shock. Cal merely chuckles under his breath. "Listen to me when I tell you to relax..."

Matt's hand reaches back and passes over Cal's close-cropped hair; the absence of hair to grip and hold onto makes him grunt in blind frustration. A kick of butterflies rippling through his stomach, he unconsciously holds his breath when Cal's finger presses into him, exhaling with a whoosh as it sinks deep and a second swiftly follows. Instinctively he shifts, turning more onto his stomach so that Cal might pleasure him better, spreading his legs and arching his back, because he's nothing if not shameless when he's under Cal's spell. His eyes slip shut and his focus narrows to that penetration, that sensation of being stretched and filled.

Faintly, he hears Cal's voice.

"I need to go, you know."

"Mmmnnhh," Matt mumbles, eyes closed, lost in his own world. "In a minute..."

"Both got work in the morning," Cal chides, lips brushing the nape of Matt's neck. The pace of his fingers slows and keeps slowing. "I don't wanna get into trouble with the BBC..."

Matt groans and squirms, forcibly pulled back from his haze of pleasure, pushing his hips back against the frustrating tease of Cal's fingers; Cal's lack of urgency while he himself isn't being stimulated so often becomes a desire to tease and torture with barely there caresses and slow, too fucking slow penetration. When Matt's body briefly relaxes, his erection presses uncomfortably hard into the mattress and his voice emerges strained. "Cal _don't you fucking dare--_ "

"It's past my bed time, Matt. You're such a bad influence." Cal curls his fingers in that tortuous 'come here' motion, still slow, so slow, and it makes Matt's toes curl. He can't gather enough of his thoughts to retort, and so merely makes a muffled, tremulous noise into the pillow, pushing himself up slightly onto his knees, pushing back, hips rocking erratically as he tries to fuck himself onto Cal's fingers because he can't stand how unbearably slowly Cal is going. He can hear the smile on Cal's face when he speaks. "Go on," he encourages softly.

Matt damn near growls under his breath at that - normally that seductive tone in Cal's voice would've been an incredible turn-on, but now it's not enough and he's too close and he just fucking wants and _needs_ and Cal is wilfully tormenting him and fuck it feels so good, so good...

He presses his forehead into the pillow, teeth set into his bottom lip as he tries unsuccessfully to angle his hips just right - it's almost, it's nearly, but it's not there and it's almost worse than if he just lay still and let Cal do whatever he wanted (virtually nothing, in all likelihood) - and he turns his head to shoot Cal a desperate look. The urge, the need to reach down between his body and the mattress and frantically jerk himself off is becoming almost too much to ignore, but he doesn't want it like that, he doesn't, he wants it to be all Cal's doing, he wants Cal to make him come--

" _Cal, c'mon, please--_ " he rushes the words out like his chest is being squeezed, eyes flickering shut as his hips buck weakly.

"Yeah, you're taking too long anyway..." Cal relents, and Matt isn't sure if he says anything else because he's suddenly fingerfucking him so quickly and so _precisely_ that he hears himself loudly exclaim "oh fuck, oh--!" and nothing else. His back arches and he goes to pieces under the stimulation of nothing more than two fingers.

Matt has barely finished coming, spasms still crackling through his muscles like a fading thunderstorm, when Cal's fingers are unceremoniously withdrawn and Cal himself is turning away and getting dressed. Out of the corner of his dazed eye, flat out on his stomach with his forehead pressing into the pillow, Matt sees Cal pull his briefs up with his thumbs, then reach to the bedside table and wipe his fingers off with a tissue. Matt has to take a few moments to collect himself before he can speak, wetting his lips.

"Not gonna finish yourself off?," he asks, attentive to the bulge in Cal's briefs before it disappears beneath his jeans. He thinks about drawing himself up and pushing Cal back down onto the bed to do it for him, but it remains merely a thought.

"Probably have a tug when I get back to mine," Cal replies. A smile playing on his lips, he pulls his shirt roughly over his head and down his torso, and bends to plant a kiss on the side of Matt's head. "Might even think about you and your nice arse while I do it."

Matt chuckles wearily and doesn't watch Cal when he leaves, burying his head in the pillow instead. When he's heard the door click, he rolls limply onto his back, the last threads of pleasure seeping away. He does his best not to think about wanting Cal to stay, or the two comestains on his otherwise clean sheets.

 

Matt isn't sure he'll ever get used to the sight of Cal flirting with another man. It not as though it doesn't happen very often; in fact it happens quite a lot. But it doesn't stop the pang of jealousy and hurt striking him squarely in the gut whenever Cal's laughing that wicked laugh of his and aiming predatory looks at someone else. Today the target happens to be Marc.

Matt doesn't know if Marc has cottoned on to Cal's obvious interest. Hell, he doesn't even know if Marc is already a past conquest and Cal is just coming back for round two, or three, or... Marc merely smiles his smile, the corners of his mouth perpetually curving upwards, and lets himself be taken in.

"Cal, he likes to play the games, no?"

A familiar, low, accented voice by his shoulder - like the proverbial angel or devil - breaks through the jealous gloom he's shrouding himself in. Matt opens his mouth and, for some stupid reason, is actually about to _defend_ Cal, to play his own shoulder angel - _it's not like that, you don't understand, it's just how he is_ \- but he bites the tip of his tongue and his expression changes into a glower. "Yeah, that sounds about right."

There's a brief pause in which Matt wonders if Cal can feel the two pairs of eyes on him, then, "Maybe you can play the games also."

Surprised, Matt's gaze swings around to find Jorge giving him a pointed look and that lopsided little smile. He never really stops to consider how much of an open secret Cal's promiscuity might be in the paddock, nor the related open secrecy of himself being firmly, hopelessly caught in Cal's orbit, but here Jorge is looking at him in _that_ way and Matt wonders fleetingly if Cal boasts about the notches on his bedpost or if he himself is just that unsubtle. He blinks a few times, flustered, and looks away. "I don't think that's the solution," he mumbles eventually, feeling his cheeks grow warm.

Jorge tilts his head to catch Matt's eye again, seeming quite amused by his reaction. "Maybe not, but is _a_ solution, no?" He shrugs, patting Matt's shoulder and letting his hand slide across his back as he moves to leave. "You know the best way."

Matt snorts. "Clearly I don't!"

Not realising it until Jorge has moved on, Matt was actually quite glad for the distraction, because Cal is still out there, doing his best to charm the pants off Marc in full view of whoever might be passing by, or indeed jealously watching from the Yamaha hospitality unit. He tries to focus on the remainder of his pasta, tries to keep the scowl from etching onto his face, with Jorge's comments playing on his mind much more than he'd like to admit.

 

Matt isn't sure why he's stood outside Jorge's motorhome, hoping nobody will notice him in the shadows, hoping Jorge will hurry up and answer his tentative knock. But that's exactly where he is, and exactly what he's doing. It feels a bit like he'd been out for a wander and somehow ended up here, without purpose or conscious thought. Or maybe that was just the bullshit explanation he was cocooning himself in.

In the same way that Cal's promiscuity is no real secret, Matt is fully aware - though he sometimes wishes he wasn't - that Jorge is in Cal's orbit too. Not for as long as Matt has been, but a pissing contest doesn't really count for anything in this respect. So with that in mind, what is he doing here, outside Jorge's motorhome? If Jorge is effectively part of the problem, part of the reason Matt sometimes feels sick with jealousy and helplessness that Cal is somewhere else, with someone else, if he _didn't_ wander here without purpose or conscious thought, then just _what the hell is he doing here_?

The skin on the back of his neck prickles when he pulls out his ringing phone and sees Cal's name. He considers not answering, but not for very long.

"You about, Matt...?" Cal's voice filters through, no greeting necessary. The sly, languorous way his words unfurl send his intentions ringing out loud and clear, but, for once, it doesn't have the desired effect on Matt.

"Not just now, mate," he replies, hesitating when the door to the motorhome swings open. Jorge's stood there at the top of the steps, in slacks and a well-loved t-shirt, peering down at him in curious surprise. Matt offers the Spaniard a slightly sheepish smile and speaks into the phone. "I'm a bit busy."

Cal answers back, and it sounds arch and flirtatious and typically Cal, but Matt hangs up without really listening. Though he does feel a slight pang of guilt, it's not enough to stop him slipping his phone back into his pocket and sidling closer to the open doorway. "I'm not interrupting anything, am I?"

"Not important," Jorge responds with a half-shrug, beckoning Matt in without him having to ask. "I don't have the tea here, I hope is okay..."

Matt laughs a little and begins to ascend the steps. "I won't be here long, then! No tea, that's terrible hospitality..."

 

"Um," Matt begins vaguely once he's inside, settling against the kitchenette counter top. He's here, so now what? He finds himself unnerved suddenly, and his gaze flicks away from Jorge's, feeling guilty just for being here, in someone else's motorhome. Which is ridiculous, right? In someone else's motorhome when right about now he's usually tangled in Cal, in muscular limbs and skin-on-skin and a wicked laugh. In someone else's motorhome when he knows, he fucking _knows_ Cal is in someone else's motorhome too... Matt shakes his head sharply to dismiss those thoughts, and frowns slightly to himself. "I don't really know why I'm here, to be honest..."

"Is maybe about before, at lunch?"

"Yeah, I suppose it is," Matt admits with some surprise, wondering if it had been playing on Jorge's mind too. He supposes it has reason to; Cal's time with Marc can't have been a pleasant sight for Jorge either. "You said before about...playing games."

"You...want to know the things Cal does?," Jorge suggests very helpfully, and it skews things a little. Matt looks stricken, then attempts to laugh it off.

"God, no! I can..." he deflates slightly, eyes going unfocussed. "I can imagine," he mutters almost to himself.

"You...want to know what to do about them?"

Matt laughs again, humourlessly now, and doesn't make eye contact. Bitterly he wonders if Cal only called him just now because Marc was busy. "Don't think there's anything I can do," he says quietly. "It's how he is." And there's that defence of Cal and his behaviour that he bit back earlier. _It's just how he is._ But it's not a defence, it's just a statement of fact, and somehow that's worse. It feels like admitting defeat.

"He does not talk about you," Jorge ventures. "When I am with him. He never say, 'there is also you'. Or Marc, or anybody. Never. I think is the same for you, no?"

Matt nods minutely, feeling his throat constrict. He doesn't really want to talk about this. "Maybe he thinks it's so obvious, he doesn't need to. And it _is_ obvious. I've seen how he looks at other blokes." In his fit of jealous pique, he remembers once seeing Jorge patting Cal's cheek and the lazy heat in his resultant grin, and it burns. He swallows. "I've seen how he looks at you."

"I see how he looks at _you_ ," Jorge counters. "Is the same. We are the same."

Despite his inward assertion that there's no point in getting into a pissing contest, Matt takes a breath to argue that he was there first, so _no_ , they're _not_ the same thank you very much, and Jorge should know when to back off, but he's interrupted by the buzz of Jorge's phone on the countertop beside him. The breath rushes back out of him in a sigh. He sags heavily and rubs his eyes while Jorge reaches for his phone, scans the message and taps out a reply. "I don't think this is helping," Matt mumbles.

Once his message is sent, Jorge sets the phone back down and leans against the countertop beside Matt, looking understandably bemused. "I don't know how I can help, if you are here for talking," he says, then looks at Matt carefully for a while, studies him long enough for Matt to feel...no, not unnerved this time, but sure as hell not comfortable either. It's as though Jorge's trying to peer into his mind. " _So_ ," Jorge says eventually, like he's actually succeeded, drawing out that lone syllable in that low voice of his. "You are not here for talking?"

 _...Fuck._ "Um." Matt feels his stomach clench and his heart race, like he's been caught out. His gaze settles on Jorge's hip, jutting out as it is, the angle his body is in pulling his t-shirt up enough to expose a sliver of pale skin. He finds it hard to pull his eyes away. "Um."

Because he knows what he's doing here. He knows _exactly_ what he's doing here, and he has done the entire time. Of course he does. Jorge had suggested he play some games of his own, and now he was here in Jorge's motorhome in laughable denial as to why.

So the Spaniard's next words shiver down his spine.

" _Quieres jugar?_ "

Cal doesn't speak Spanish, never needed to. Matt has watched him be fed lines in Spanish for promotional material, smiling to himself at the poor pronunciation and accent - not in a smug way, not really; in an affectionate, _oh, Cal_ way. But the fact is, Cal doesn't speak Spanish. He doesn't roll his rs in _that_ way, or allow his words to run together like flowing water, or have that low pitch that's hitting Matt just right, and he certainly doesn't ask Matt _quieres jugar?_.

_Do you want to play?_

Jorge shifts and that sliver of skin disappears back under his t-shirt, and Matt dimly contemplates making it appear again.

He thinks about Cal, pointedly thinks about him in a way he's been trying not to since watching him flirt with Marc earlier. It brings on a wave of bitter frustration, a burn that most days he can tell himself to ignore and everything just carries on like it always has, but tonight it won't and he knows it. Because he's in Jorge's motorhome, and he's there for a reason.

Finally he meets Jorge's eyes. The way he's being looked at makes his cheeks feel red hot. It's similar to the way Cal looks at him, similar...but not the same. Brown, not blue, eyes pull him in, heat and interest and confidence that he's going to respond, that he's already in too far, so why stop now? He moves purposefully closer to the Spaniard, close enough to feel his body heat and the way it makes him tingle in anticipation, close enough to speak his answer softly.

" _Sí. Quiero._ "

 

_End of Part One._


	2. Chapter 2

" _Sí. Quiero._ "

The words have barely passed his lips before he's kissing Jorge, open mouthed and hungry and Jorge is making a sound low in his throat that shoots straight to Matt's groin. He hears his heart thudding in his ears as hands pass over his body, pulling their hips together, squeezing his ass, attentive exploration that reacts to his little moans and seeks to make them bigger.

Fingers wrap around his wrist and pull him along into the depths of the motorhome and his knees hit mattress before he even knows he's moved. Jorge pulls them both back across the bed, sprawling beneath Matt, arching into his touch while his hands roam Matt's back and pull him down. He bites at Jorge's full bottom lip, hard enough to make the Spaniard grunt and claw his shoulders, returning the kiss with equal ferocity.

A momentary break for air has Jorge sloughing off his shirt, body almost rippling as it exposes pale, toned flesh, and roughly tugging at Matt's to free it from his trousers. His attention is diverted when Matt tips his head back to lick his throat, and Jorge's resultant groan vibrates against his tongue. His breath is hot and ragged against Jorge's neck, desperation he didn't know he could feel rushing through his veins. His teeth graze Jorge's shoulder, biting at thick muscle, and Jorge grips the back of his neck and ruts against him.

He returns to Jorge's mouth and finds himself suddenly surprised when there's no prickly jaw, no wicked grin, no dirty laugh. He slows, distracted, disoriented; he kisses that full pout, feels the graze of that sprinkling of stubble, hears that low, wordless moan, and slows again, pulling back. And everything sort of shudders to a halt.

" _¿Esta bien?_ " Jorge asks. Then, again, "Everything is okay?"

Matt shakes his head slightly, more to himself than anything, staring blankly at a spot on Jorge's collarbone and listening to his own panting. "Um," he says, unable to connect his fragmented thoughts into something that makes sense. Then he sinks back onto Jorge's thighs, deflated and sheepish. "This...this wasn't really part of the plan. I don't think."

Jorge pushes himself up on his elbows. The look on his face suggests he isn't surprised by this, which for some reason makes Matt feel more guilty. "I think maybe you go to the wrong motorhome."

"I dunno," Matt mumbles, sheepishness sliding into deep, deep embarrassment, and rubs his eyes with his thumb and forefinger. "Maybe. I dunno. Fucking hell."

In the moments following, he can feel Jorge's eyes on him, feel himself being watched, but can't bring himself to make eye contact. More to the point, he feels the solid, warm body between his thighs and can't think of a way of getting up and off that won't strip him of even more dignity. Perhaps he can slink off and disappear out of here without feeling the need to apologise profusely for existing.

He hears the bed creak and feels Jorge move beneath him, and opens his eyes to see the defined muscles of the Spaniard's torso tense as he sits up. Jorge slides a hand around the back of Matt's head and, when he doesn't resist, pulls him into a long, slow kiss; it bowls Matt over so much that for a moment he wonders if he has, in fact, been going to the wrong motorhome before now. Jorge shifts under him, lifting his hips and coaxing a soft moan past Matt's lips.

He tells himself he'll stop soon, tells himself he'll break away from this unfamiliar mouth and these gentle hands and slip away like he was never here, but his stupid ignorant body doesn't listen. It responds to Jorge's touch, lizard brain awake and growing ever more alert to the base, primal warmth and friction between his thighs. Jorge rolls his hips so fluidly and kisses him so tenderly that Matt just wants to submerge himself in it all, to drown in someone else.

" _Sí?_ " Jorge breathes the word against his lips when he breaks the kiss for a brief moment, a single syllable that feels like torture, like he's dangling this moment in front of him, ready to snatch it away at any time.

" _Sí, Sí…_ " Matt pants, rocking his hips in time with Jorge's, clinging onto the younger man. " _Por favor, sí…_ "

Their movements are now no less urgent but more deliberate, more focussed. Matt groans and pushes his fingers through short waves of dark hair, hand sliding to cup Jorge's head and bring their foreheads together, and they bump noses and smear kisses and rut and grunt until it's all just friction and desire.

Matt watches Jorge, the dark eyelashes against the pale skin of his cheeks, the slight crease between his eyebrows, the fullness of his reddened, kiss bruised bottom lip. He licks his own bottom lip reflexively, pulling it between his teeth and biting down to make it hurt. 

"F… _más rápido…_ " he mumbles, gulping down air when Jorge obliges, fingers bruising his hips, and he doesn't know how he's managing to translate things like _faster_ and _harder_ when his focus has narrowed to a pinpoint, to the swell of pleasure in the pit of his stomach and the way Jorge makes his moans escalate, but Spanish spills out of him until his words dissolve and he soon follows. His fingers twist and grip Jorge's hair as the Spaniard buries his head in his chest, the flex of his thighs lifting them both off the bed as he comes with a hoarse moan.

A curious elation slips through Matt's bloodstream when all becomes settled, beyond the bright glow after orgasm. He even laughs disbelievingly, a breathless, soft noise as Jorge looks up at him with those hazel eyes full of sated warmth, fingers flexing against his thighs and sliding up to his hips, holding him in place, almost like he might want him to stay. Maybe he will stay, he thinks, caught up so completely in darker eyes than he's known before; maybe this doesn't have to just be a way of getting b--

With gutwrenching suddenness, it's all ripped away when a hand fists into the back of his shirt, yanking him backwards hard enough to lay him out on his back, and then he's staring up at the upside-down face of Cal. 

"Oh yeah, you said you were busy," he says, but his voice is devoid of humour and there's no trace of the usual smirk on his lips. Matt lips in turn move soundlessly, struck dumb by shock and that fury in cold blue eyes. He tears his gaze away to look at Jorge for something, anything, and what he sees is an utter, _utter_ lack of repentance. Jorge glares at Cal, bold and insolent, resting back on his hands and not saying a word. There's a flash of something cold and sickening in Matt's stomach at that look, but his attention is already back on Cal before his reeling mind can begin to make sense of it. He twists - squirms - onto his front and stares up at his lover, and when Cal's burning gaze flicks from Jorge back to him, Matt wilts, shamefaced.

"Right. Fucking...whatever, I'll leave you to it," Cal snaps, and turns his back on them. Matt doesn't find his voice until Cal's virtually out of earshot, calling his name hoarsely without a single thought in his head of what he'd say if Cal actually came back. He doesn't, of course, and once Matt hears the bus door slam it leaves him to scrabble after his shattered thoughts. Eventually he pushes himself up onto his knees and looks around to Jorge, finding that insolent glare has faded to a resentful simmer, no trace left of that soft, post-coital warmth in his eyes from just minutes ago. It's almost an entirely different man sat before him.

Or like everything before was just an act, and now the mask has slipped.

"Did you know? Did you know he was coming here?" Matt asks, disbelief resonant in his voice. Realisation begins to creep up on him, cold fingertips trailing up his spine. "Your phone earlier, when it-- Fuck me, did you _invite him_?"

Jorge is silent for a few moments, and then his gaze slides away, sullen and remorseless. "Is stupid to play the game if he knows nothing."

Matt's stomach drops like a stone. He wanted to play Cal at his own game. He _wanted_ to, there's no denying it. Now he feels sick and the cold fury on Cal's face is echoing through his head and _fuck_ and-- "I didn't think…" he says haltingly, distraught. "This isn't…"

"Follow him," Jorge murmurs as Matt flounders, nodding his head towards where Cal disappeared. He looks resigned. "He will not learn. But is what you want."

Of course it is.

At first Matt's head is full to bursting of desperate apologies, of how best to grovel for Cal's forgiveness - but only at first. Once he's out of the bus and following Cal's distant figure at a hurried almost-jog, a voice alerts him: _what the fuck are you doing? You're going to apologise to him for this? **Him** , of all people? After everything he's done? **What the fuck are you doing?**_ The desperation ebbs and with the benefit of sudden clarity of thought, bitter indignance flows in its place; Cal does this almost every fucking day he's in the paddock, and does he ever feel ashamed? Does he fuck. Once he deems Cal to be within close enough earshot, he calls out.

"How do you do it, eh?" He's louder than he should be at this time of night in the middle of the paddock, and his voice shakes with adrenalin, but it's enough to make Cal stop dead and turn to face him.

" _You wanna keep your fucking voice down?_ " he hisses as Matt approaches, eyes alight with anger.

"I feel fucking terrible right now, seeing that look on your face in there," Matt says, ignoring the other man's words. It's perhaps fortunate for the both of them that he's now close enough not to need to raise his voice. "But if it's the other way around, it's like it's nothing. Like _I'm_ nothing. What is that about, eh? Do you _ever_ feel guilty?" he asks, anger and frustration welling up ever more inside him. "Ever?"

Cal regards him with equal parts wariness and distaste. "What for?"

Matt laughs, a single burst of a noise that might have sounded a bit more like a sob, had he let it. He looks up to the heavens in despair and dimly hopes Cal doesn't notice the glint of tears in his eyes.

"You know what, I don't think you do this deliberately, you can't possibly be that much of a prick. You're just ignorant. You treat people the way you do - people, not just me - and feelings get hurt and I just don't even think it fucking _registers_ with you." He taps the side of his head as he speaks, but Cal remains outwardly unmoved, which only irritates him further. Clenching his jaw, he snaps, "Or am I wrong? Which is it, are you thick or a callous cunt?"

"A callous cunt," Cal responds without much hesitation, looking him up and down with disdain. "If that's all I'm choosing from."

"Oh, sorry mate, is it not that simple?" Matt sneers.

He is sternly, fiercely telling himself not to really spill his guts out to Cal. Now more than ever before, even with all this bitter rage, it's all there hammering in his heart and waiting to burst out of him, making his throat tight and his chest ache like so many time before. It's there, ready, threatening to break loose and make everything so much worse.

_Do not tell him you love him._

_Do **not** tell him you love him._

He keeps the words at bay for now. Instead he moves closer to Cal, but the other man takes a step back.

"Do you know why they tell us not to get involved with presenters and journos and that?" Cal asks, and Matt senses it's rhetorical. "It took me a while to work it out 'cos I steered clear."

Matt laughs sharply like it's the stupidest question he's ever heard, trying not to let Cal's step back shake him. He counts off on his fingers. "Where do we start? It's unprofessional, it's distracting, it's compromising, it's so, _so_ fucking stupid..."

Cal interrupts. "Because you'll get your heart broken."

Matt's eyes widen. Briefly, his heart races, and he feels sick all over again, the anger freezing up inside him. _Heart broken. Heart…_ He tries fruitlessly to read into Cal's gaze, the words reverberating bewilderingly around his skull, before he yanks himself back to reality. He scoffs.

"N-no, no, don't fucking stand there and tell me, when you'll go around the whole paddock and fuck anyone who'll have you, do _not_ speak to me about getting a broken heart."

"Yeah, alright, I'll fuck anyone, if you say so," Cal retorts, scowl etched on his face. "That is what makes you better than me. You've always been a better person than me until just now - bike racers sleep around and that and we don't get attached to each other because who fucking knows if you'll still be around tomorrow? So you stick to fucking other riders and stay well fucking clear of journos and presenters and commentators and all that, because they're professional and grounded and sensible and everything you'll never be, and if you get involved with that, somebody's gonna end up with a broken fucking heart." he pauses in his tirade and exhales sharply. "Because you're the grown up and I'm the fuck up."

Not for the first time, Matt is finding it difficult to tell if Cal is being serious or not. This all could be passive-aggressive lashing out, or it could be the truth, or it could be somewhere in between. Whichever it is, the words strike Matt like a punch to the chest. He stares at Cal in all his anger, his own fury having been spirited out of him, leaving behind it only a painful ache.

It sounds as though, Matt thinks, that maybe he hasn't been the only one trying to keep everything from spilling over...

"Just because you say you're the fuck up doesn't make it true," he murmurs. His expression darkens. "It doesn't mean you have to embrace it, either."

He moves closer, and this time Cal remains still, offering only his unchanged glare, his sullen mouth. He doesn't flinch away when Matt tentatively reaches out to touch Cal's forearm, nor when fingers brush down that forearm to curl around his hand. He's warm, so warm to the touch, and Matt has to resist the urge that spikes in his heart to pull that muscular arm around his waist. Cal doesn't tug his hand free and it gives Matt a little flicker of hope. _We can sort this. We can._

"Look, if you think you're a fuck up because of what you do, then can't you just…" he pauses, shrugging quite hopelessly. "...Pick someone?" Though he laughs a little at how simply he lays it out there, he sounds exasperated, worn out, tired of it all, because he is, he really is. He squeezes Cal's hand gently, all the while wanting to bring it up to his mouth and kiss it, kiss every little fingertip, the thumb, the heel, the centre of the palm and close Cal's fingers over it - _that's yours, I'm yours_ \- but again, like so many times before, he resists. He squeezes Cal's hand a little tighter instead. Then, quietly, with a desperate little smile on his face, "Can't you just pick me?"

Cal looks at him levelly with those penetrating blue eyes, a crease between his eyebrows that Matt just wants to reach up to and smooth out. Matt notices the muscle in his jaw flex as it clenches, sees his Adam's Apple bob as he swallows. Then his expression hardens, and his answer is simple.

"No."

Matt half expected that, honestly. He didn't expect it to feel like such a hammer blow.

"Cal..." Distantly he hears himself say the name, but without anything in mind to follow it. Cal turns and walks away, and Matt can't stop him. It's not until he flinches at the sound of Cal's motorhome door slamming that he snaps out of it; he breathes again, not aware that he'd been breathless until then, and looks around, suddenly aware of where he is. He doesn't know if he's glad to be alone.

He walks back through the paddock in a daze, glancing at Jorge's motorhome where there's no sign of the Spaniard. The blinds are drawn, the door is closed, and the vehicle sits in silence. He passes it without slowing. It's only when he reaches his rental car in the quiet car park that he pauses, sinking to rest his forehead against the edge of the roof.

"Such a fucking prick," he whispers.

 

Matt isn't sure why he puts himself through this. Why he doesn't just walk away, why he doesn't turn and just fucking _walk away_ from this kind of thing. But he doesn't, he never does. It's as though nothing has changed, because nothing has changed. So he watches from afar, as subtly as he can in a busy paddock, as Cal moves in on his target, cackles and flirts and looks them up and down like he's planning where to leave his teeth marks this time, the spark of lust bright in his eyes.

And Jorge smiles, that spark reflected.


End file.
